On the Twenty Second Day
by MandyQ
Summary: With Narcissa in a coma and tiny Draco still too weak to come home, Lucius has tried his best to cope. But the arrival of a certain visitor on the twenty second day may be more than he can handle. Oneshot. no spoilers. TDH compliant. Please R&R.


DISCLAIMER: The characters and settings contained within the following piece of fiction belong to someone more fabulous than me. I am not empowered to play with them, but I am playing wih them anyway. Since I haven't made any money on this I am guessing that I won't be sued for anything. Seeing as I am a full time housewife and have nothing, I assure everyone that suing me wouln't net anything anyway.

A/N: This piece was sitting on a thumb drive that I'd lost and have now found. Here is something I had forgotten about...

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The first few days had been the hardest to bear. When the healers had first brought Narcissa to St. Mungo's, Lucius had thought that he would certainly go crazy. He hadn't any idea as to how to handle a crisis such as this. It had taken the kind act of Evelyn Crouch, a nurse and distant cousin of Narcissa's, to get his brain so much as functioning again.

The first two days after Draco's birth, Narcissa's condition had been so tenuous that the Healers dared not move her. The baby had been taken immediately to hospital, as he had come nearly a full eight weeks early and had need of specialized care, but Narcissa had been tended to by Healers and nurses who were in and out of Malfoy manor constantly. She was in a coma, they had told him; something to do with a 'minor cardiac event' due to blood lost during the delivery. It wasn't until late in the afternoon on the second day they decided that she was well enough to move and had sent for a coach to bring her to London.

Lucius had been made to get himself to the hospital, Healers insisting that he not accompany them in the coach. And then they wouldn't let him in to see her. Lucius hadn't left his wife's side since her premature delivery and subsequent health crisis and he was having a terrible time waiting to be allowed into the room where they were getting her settled. Evelyn had found him in the hallway, pacing.

Evelyn had made him go up and meet his son. And she had called on Narcissa's mother and sister with the news. Lucius had mentally kicked himself for not having had the presence of mind to tell them that the baby had come and that Narcissa was sick, but he had barely the presence of mind to keep breathing. Druella Black and Bellatrix Lestrange had arrived presently, and had taken a great deal of the load off of his mind.

And in the twenty two days that had passed since his wife had come to St. Mungo's to join their son, Lucius had fallen into a routine of sorts. He spent half an hour in the nursery every four hours to give tiny Draco a bottle and the rest of the time he spent with Narcissa. She hadn't so much as twitched a finger or batted an eyelash since the baby had come, but he sat next to her bed every day waiting for her to wake up.

Luckily, Draco was doing much better than his mother. The little boy had been born at just three and a quarter pounds, but had in twenty-two days had gained more than half a pound. He ate well and slept soundly and seemed to be on the road to complete health. Lucius had found himself enjoying his time with his little son. He had named him and had learned how to feed him and to soothe him. It was a comfort to Lucius to spend this time with his baby, and more so to know that Narcissa wasn't alone while he tended to their child.

Druella Black hadn't left the hospital since she had arrived twenty-two days before. She sat with Narcissa when Lucius was with Draco and she sat with Draco when Lucius was with Narcissa. He had never been so grateful for anyone's assistance in his entire life. Even Bellatrix, who had always been his good-natured nemesis, had been kind and helpful to him as she too had sat vigil at her sister's bedside.

It was largely due to the attendance of her mother and sister that Lucius was able leave Narcissa long enough to relax with his tiny son as he was doing now. He rocked the baby slowly, lulling him to sleep as his now empty bottle sat on the nearest table. Little Draco seemed not to want to fall asleep and was fussing with his father. Lucius was doing his best to soothe the unhappy infant, but it seemed as though no amount of rocking and shushing was going to get him to quiet. Lucius shut his eyes and tried to remain calm, cradling the baby in his arms and allowing the enchanted rocking chair to move at its own measured and even pace.

As he looked down at the baby, Lucius caught sight of someone out of the corner of his eye. There was a flash of color; an unnatural orange skirt swished past the nursery window. That did not coincide with the clothing usually worn by the Healers and the nurses at St. Mungo's. Lucius shook his head; he was getting jumpy from lack of sleep and worry. What did he care if there was someone on the ward? What he did care about was the fact that he wasn't finding himself capable of being patient with his little son as the infant continued to cry.

"Would you like me to take him, Mr. Malfoy?" the duty nurse asked him from the other side of the room. The girl's name was Meg, and Lucius had already decided that he would be offering her a job caring for Draco when the baby was released. Meg was one of three girls that Lucius had met at the hospital who he would be willing to pay any amount of money to have care for his son once they brought him home. Meg had the patience of a saint, and Lucius was more than happy to let her take his cranky baby.

"Please, Meg," Lucius asked, standing from the rocking chair and crossing to hand the baby off. "He seems displeased at the moment," he explained to the nurse as she took little Draco from his father's arms.

"Oh come here little dragon heart," Meg said to Draco as she put the baby on her shoulder and began patting his little back. "Mr. Malfoy," she addressed to Lucius. "He's not displeased," she said to him with a smile. "He's telling you how healthy he is and that he'd like you to go check on his mother." She smiled even brighter and inclined her head at him. Lucius nodded.

"I should do just that," he agreed. "I'll be back for his four o'clock bottle," he said to her. Lucius patted his son's tiny blonde head and turned to leave the room.

The walk from the nursery to the stairs was a brief one, and it was only two short flights to the critical non-magical ward of the hospital where Narcissa was quartered. He approached the entrance to her private room solemnly and pushed open the door. Druella Black was massaging Narcissa's temples with her fingers and Bellatrix was sitting next to the bed reading aloud from something in Latin that Lucius was sure Narcissa could understand every word of. _Could have understood…._

There was no way to know what she was and was not aware of, but Lucius was convinced that she could hear everything that was said in the room and had insisted that she not be left with too much quiet during daylight hours. He had even thought to bring the baby down here so that she could hear him cry, but had been discouraged from taking the still under-sized preemie too far from the nursery. He looked so forward to the day when he could introduce their baby to his mother, and in the mean time, he did what he could to try and bring her out of her coma and back to her family.

"Today I have muget oil," Druella explained to Lucius as he came into the room. "Cissy always liked the smell of muget."

"Anything?" Lucius asked, his voice betraying his doubt as to any improvement in his wife's condition. Her mother and sister both shook their heads.

"You look dreadful, Lucius," Bellatrix commented, shutting her book and rising from her chair to cross to him.

"Say that while looking in a mirror, Bellatrix," he snapped back at her. He knew that Bella likely meant well enough, but he would be damned if he was going to abide anything like an insult at the moment. Besides; Bella looked just as tired and worn out as he did.

"Bella's right," her mother told him. "Have you slept?" she asked. Lucius shook his head. He knew it was almost a rhetorical question; Druella Black knew full and well that he had not been sleeping since they'd come to the hospital. "How about food, Lucius," she asked as a follow-up. "Have you eaten anything?" she asked.

"No, I'm not hungry." he grumbled by way of reply. He took a few steps toward the bed where his wife lay and sat down beside her. Lucius reached his fingers out to brush against her face and then took her hand in his.

"If I were to bring you something, would you eat it?" Druella asked him as she bent to gather a few things out of a chair near to the head of the bed.

"Don't give him a choice, mother," Bellatrix instructed, rounding the foot of the bed to Lucius' side and placing her hand on his shoulder. "You're going to eat something, Lucius," Bella told him. "You'll eat even if it's under the Imperious curse," she added. Lucius frowned at her but nodded his head. He knew that Bellatrix was not kidding in the least. She had never had any compunction against using an unforgivable curse to get what she wanted and right now it seemed as though the thing she wanted the most was to take care of her sister's husband.

"Bellatrix, don't threaten," her mother warned. "But Lucius…" Her expression change to be even more stern that it had been. "You will eat something," she declared. Lucius nodded. He knew better than to argue when the two of them had ganged up on him. The Black women had a way about them that Lucius was well aware would win out in the end; after all, he had married one of them. Better not to waste what little energy he had arguing with his in-laws. "Come," Druella Black implored her daughter. "Let's look in on the baby and then we'll send Dobby out after tea and sandwiches." She crossed to Lucius and kissed his forehead. "You need to take care of yourself, Lucius," she reminded him. "You're the only parent that baby has right now, and you must keep up your strength to take care of him."

"Cissa will be better before Draco comes home," Lucius said to her blankly. He knew he might be dreaming when he said that, but he had to believe it lest he go mad right this instant.

"Of course she will be," Druella affirmed as though she believed it to be s true as Lucius wanted it to be. "But then you'll have both of them to take care of," she added. "Cissy won't be altogether well for a few weeks at least," she said. "Child bearing is taxing under the best of circumstances." Druella looked over at Bellatrix, who was still glowering at Lucius. His mother-in-law had a point. He should be taking better care of himself; but as far as he was concerned he could stand not to. What he couldn't stand was the idea that he might not be there for either his adored wife or his precious son were either of them to need comforting.

No one else had fed Draco even a single bottle since Lucius had come to St. Mungo's. And he had not missed a single instance of the Healers visiting Draco or Narcissa. Not once in twenty-two days had he missed a moment of significance to the health of either of his loved ones. He couldn't fathom the idea of stopping his constant vigil over his family long enough to indulge in anything so selfish as a decent meal or a few hours' sleep.

"I'm fine," he tried to convince his mother-in-law. Druella shook her head and rolled her eyes.

"Don't listen to him mother," Bellatrix scoffed. "I'll slip him a mickey in his teacup so that he'll have to get a few hours of sleep later."

"You'll do no such thing, Bella," her mother countered. "We'll not keep Lucius from even one feeding with Draco," she added. Druella turned to Lucius and shook her head slowly. "But perhaps we can let you alone for a while tonight with a promise to get you when it comes time…?" Lucius shrugged his shoulders. In twenty-two days, he had become used to the occasional insistence of these omnipresent yet well-meaning women that he sleep, and he had learned early on that he was best served by listening to them and taking them up on their offer to wake him to feed the baby. The first night that they had made such an offer he had barely slept; fearful that they never meant to actually wake him. But sure enough: one or the other had come for him every four hours so that he could go up to the nursery to his son.

"All right," Lucius acquiesced. "Tea and sandwiches first," he agreed. "I'll be here."

"Alright, dear," Druella said back to him as she started toward the door. "You keep Cissy company and we'll be back soon." She turned her head to face her daughter. "Come Bella," she instructed. Bellatrix did as she was told and followed her mother to and then out of the door.

Lucius shook his head slowly and stood from his perch on the edge of Narcissa's bed. He ran his hand through this hair as he slowly rounded the foot of the bed and took up a seat in the chair that Bellatrix had just vacated. He scooted the chair closer to his wife's bedside and leaned his head in to kiss her cheek. Lucius took his wife's bony hand in both of his as he rested his forehead against her pillow.

"Our son is growing every day, pet," he told her. "You should see him," he encouraged, his breath catching in his throat. It seemed as though every time he thought that he had no more tears to cry, more seemed to find his eyes when he spoke to Narcissa. "I miss you," he whispered to her, shutting his eyes to try and stem the flow of these fresh tears. He kept old of her hand as he leaned back in his chair and tilted his face toward the ceiling. Lucius sighed heavily and shook his head. "Damn it Narcissa," he said to her, squeezing her hand more tightly than likely was prudent.

There was a subtle noise and it occurred to Lucius almost immediately that it had been the door knob turning. He hadn't expected the ladies back so soon. He tilted his face back toward the door as it opened.

The first thing he recognized as the door came open was the bright orange skirt that he had been sure he'd spotted earlier upstairs in the nursery. His eyes rose from the unnatural color of the garment to the face of the woman wearing it. Lucius gasped and nearly leapt from his chair as the glimmer of recognition passed over him.

"I…" she began, obviously surprised at finding him there.

"You can't be here, Anny," Lucius said to her. He couldn't really believe his eyes. The woman in the orange skirt had been his wife's other sister.

Andromeda Black had been his best friend in school, and they had even kept in touch after she had run off and eloped. But he had been insistent that they stop writing each other when he had married Narcissa; lest she learn of his ongoing friendship with her disowned sister. They hadn't exchanged so much as a word in five years, and yet here she stood, not three feet from him, looking as terrified as he was.

"Please, Lucius," she whispered to him, her hand still on the doorknob. "Just for a minute," she implored.

"Your mother…" he said to her, "Bellatrix.…" He was having a very difficult time forming an intelligible sentence at the moment. As though he weren't already overwhelmed near to the point of breaking, Andromeda's appearance had certainly added to his strain and his mind seemed wholly unable of having a complete thought.

"I waited until I saw them leave," An shared with him, stepping further into the room and allowing the door to close behind her. "I waited for three weeks," she explained, taking yet another step toward her comatose sister. "Every day I was just sure that Cissy would wake up and everything would be all right. But eventually I had to admit to myself that it might not," she paused for a moment, sniffling as she did and blotting her eyes with the back of her sleeve. "I had to see her one last time," she declared.

"Don't talk like that," Lucius ordered her, his voice suddenly firm and steady. "Narcissa is not dying," he insisted. "She's not," he reiterated, his eyes becoming moist again. Andromeda nodded her head and bit her lip.

"Is that a medical opinion?" Andromeda asked him, "or the world according to Lucius Malfoy?"

"Does it matter?" he asked her gruffly, narrowing his eyes.

"I saw you with your son," she told him by way of changing the subject, her face tilting away from him and down toward where her sister lay. "He's beautiful," she added.

"Yes, he is," Lucius agreed, his features softening at her admiration of his perfect little child.

"Lucius," An said, looking up at him again, "I…."

"Don't," he interrupted her. "Just don't say anything else." He had neither the time nor the inclination, much less the emotional strength at the moment to have any sort of meaningful conversation with Andromeda. He could let her stand there for a minute if she wished, but he was in no mood to entertain any apologies or explanations.

The sound of the door handle erupted again just then, and a pleasant voice came in to the room as it swung open. "The duty nurse kicked us out," Druella Black said to her son-in-law as she pushed open the door "She says that she just got him to sleep and that we'd be better off leaving him be until he…" Her words were cut off mid stream as she spotted the recent arrival. Bellatrix, too, seemed to have been caught off guard, but managed to get herself into the room and her wand drawn on her middle sister.

"You…" Bellatrix growled, snarling at Andromeda as she moved into the room with her mother. The two of them moved slowly around to the foot of Narcissa's bed, as though they were ready for an ambush. "Get out!" she demanded.

"What do you think you're doing here?" Druella Black asked her middle child, her face forming the single most unpleasant expression that Lucius had ever seen her wear.

"I…" An was clearly struggling to compose herself enough to answer her mother's inquiry. "I came to see Cissy," she answered timidly.

"Well take a good long look then," her mother spat, casting her eyes down at her youngest daughter's still form under the blanket. "My Cissy almost died giving birth to her beautiful pureblood son," she sneered, "It should have been you," she added, more and more venom seeping into her voice with every syllable. "Should have been you and that filthy mudblood mongrel that you begat…"

"Stop it!" Lucius demanded, his wrath directed at each of the three women equally. He looked down at his wife and back at her family. "I will not have you speaking in those tones in front of Narcissa," he insisted, much more quietly and with his attention primarily focused on his comatose wife. He lay her hand back on the bed before taking a step toward the foot of her bed. "This is not helping," he chided the three of them. "If you ladies feel the need to yell at each other and act completely uncivilized I cannot stop you, but I will insist that you do so out of earshot of my wife."

"Get out," Bellatrix ordered Andromeda again. This time An nodded, looking once again at Narcissa.

"You're leaving, Andromeda," Lucius informed her, having understood her gesture of willingness to depart. "I will show you to the door," he said to her, "and I expect not see you again." He brushed past Druella and Bellatrix, placing his hand n his sister-in-law's wand as he went, signaling to her that she had best put it away. He took Andromeda by the arm and brought her bodily out of the room and into the hallway.

They did not exchange so much as a look as he led her through the corridor and down the stairs at the end of the hall. He tried not to be too rough with her as they rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs and he led her toward the door.

"What the hell did you come here for, Anny?" Lucius asked her as they paused just before reaching exit.

"She's my sister, Lucius," An replied, shaking her head. "I had to see her."

"Well now you have," he affirmed. He frowned at her and sighed.

"I'm sorry," she said with a sniffle.

"What did you think was going to happen?" he asked. "Did you really think that your mother and Bellatrix were going to just forgive you for betraying everything that they held dear and running out on them?"

"I just thought about Cissy," she answered. He knew that she was being honest when she said that. Andromeda had always been more capricious than was entirely prudent and it was wholly believable to him that she hadn't thought through to the consequences of her visit. It seemed in that moment as though time had changed her very little.

"Don't do this again," he instructed her. "Do not come back here." Andromeda nodded in agreement. "And don't try to come to any," he choked on the word, "funeral." He caught himself on the verge of breaking down at the sound of that word. He hadn't brought himself to say it out loud even once since this tragic series of events had begun.

"I won't," a now visibly weeping Andromeda assured him. "Let's just hope it won't come to that," she added.

"That hope is all I'm living on," he said back to her. As trying as this encounter had proven, it was suddenly of great comfort to Lucius to have his old friend here beside him to share his concerns. "It was good to see you, Anny," he admitted. She smiled at him through her tears and moved to embrace him. He allowed her to put her arms around him, and wrapped his own around her shoulders.

"I've missed you, Lucius," she said to him when the brief hug was over.

"Take care of yourself, Anny," he said to her, inclining his head toward the door in case she had thought to prolong her departure.

"Take care of you, Lucius," she said back to him, "and take care of my baby sister," she added, "and my little nephew."

"You know I will," he replied. Andromeda nodded her head.

"I know you will," she affirmed before turning to walk the few remaining steps to the exit door.

"What do you want me to tell her?" he called after An as she pushed open the hospital door, letting in the sounds of the muggle street outside. "When she wakes up," he clarified.

"Don't say anything unless she asks," Anny answered him, "it's better this way." She let go of the door just then and disappeared into the street. Lucius took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He could only hope that he would not have to diffuse his in-laws' tempers when he reached his wife's bedside again.

He felt totally and completely drained as he made his way up the few flights of stairs and onto the hallway where his beloved lay between life and death. He reached the door to her room and found no sign of Bellatrix; perhaps she had gone someplace to cool off. His mother-in-law sat alone at Narcissa's bedside, her face buried in her folded arms as they rested on the mattress beside her daughter. She looked up at him as he came into the room and he could tell that she was trying very hard to stop tears from falling.

"It just isn't fair," Druella declared, wiping her cheeks with her palms.

"No," Lucius said back to her. He knew that he was speaking of broader things than she was. Of course it wasn't fair for his pretty and brilliant young wife to have been struck down like this. It wasn't fair that she'd been forced to endure two miscarriages before ever having a viable pregnancy and it wasn't fair that they had waited and feared and hoped for this long only to see suck a bleak outcome. But neither was it fair of Mrs. Black to take out all of her anger and fear and sadness on her middle daughter. This tragedy wasn't Andromeda's fault. Lucius could see that it had been out of genuine concern that Anny had come to see them today. And he was sure that, had the family been willing to allow her presence, she would have gladly embraced them again. It wasn't fair that the world was filled with such choices; that Anny Black had been forced to choose at eighteen years old what family she was to have for the rest of her life and that she might never have the chance to reconsider such a decision. "Mother Black," he said to her, moving toward where Narcissa lay and pulling the door to behind him.

"What is it, dear?" she asked as she sat up a little straighter.

"Could you see about the tea and sandwiches?" he asked. "Get Dobby to bring them in just before time for Draco's bottle? I'd like to get some rest, I think. But I'm sure I'll be hungry in a few hours." Druella rose from her chair and smiled at her son-in-law.

"Of course I will," she assured him. "You get some rest and I'll be back to wake you when it comes time." She patted his shoulder as she passed him on her way out of the room. Once his mother-in-law was out in the hall with the door firmly shut behind her, Lucius cast a locking charm and a silencing charm on it. He seated himself on the bed beside Narcissa and slowly lowered his head to rest on the pillow just next to her. He took her hand in his and brought her fingers to his lips, kissing the back of her knuckles briefly before pressing her hand into his chest and drawing in a very deep breath.

He wasn't sure what she could or could not hear, and he had no idea just how much of this afternoon's exchange she might have been able to understand, but something in him made him feel as though he owed her an explanation of this afternoon's tumult. And he had only agreed not to tell her of her sister's visit after she woke up. He tilted his head so that his forehead was resting against hers and closed his eyes as he began speaking.

"You had an unexpected visitor today, pet…."

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Let me know what you thought about it. I am now going back to my current work in progress. More on that piece tonight or early tomorrow. THANKS for reading!

-MQ


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